THE NATION is at war. It is mired in debt. It has been hit by floods and hurricanes. In the face of this adversity, congressional leaders have rightly dropped proposals for yet more tax cuts, and some have suggested removing the pork from the recently passed transportation bill. But this spirit of forbearance has not touched the Louisiana congressional delegation. The state's representatives have come up with a request for $250 billion in federal reconstruction funds for Louisiana alone -- more than $50,000 per person in the state. This money would come on top of payouts from businesses, national charities and insurers. And it would come on top of the $62.3 billion that Congress has already appropriated for emergency relief.

Like looters who seize six televisions when their homes have room for only two, the Louisiana legislators are out to grab more federal cash than they could possibly spend usefully. For example, their bill demands $7 billion for rebuilding evacuation and energy supply routes, but it also demands a separate $5 billion for road building and makes no mention of the $3.1 billion already awarded to the state in the recent transportation legislation. The bill demands $50 billion in community development block grants, partly to get small businesses going, but it also demands $150 million for a small-business loan fund plus generous business tax breaks. The bill even asks for $35 million for seafood marketing and $25 million for a sugar-cane research laboratory. This is the equivalent of New York responding to the attacks on the World Trade Center by insisting upon a federally financed stadium in Brooklyn.

The Louisiana delegation has apparently devoted little thought to the root causes of the Hurricane Katrina disaster. New Orleans was flooded not because the Army Corps of Engineers had insufficient money to build flood protections, but because its money was allocated by a system of political patronage. The smart response would be to insist that, in the future, no Corps money be wasted on unworthy projects, but the Louisiana bill instead creates a mechanism by which cost-benefit analysis can be avoided. Equally, Katrina was devastating because ill-conceived projects have drained coastal wetlands and caused their erosion, destroying a natural buffer between hurricanes and human settlements. The smart response would be to insist that future infrastructure projects be subject to careful environmental review. But the Louisiana delegation's bill would suspend the environmental review process. Rather than grappling with the lessons of Katrina, Louisiana's representatives are demanding an astonishing $40 billion worth of Corps of Engineers projects in their state. That is 16 times more than the Corps says it would need to protect New Orleans from a Category 5 hurricane.

The Louisiana bill is so preposterous that its authors can't possibly expect it to pass; it's just the first round in a process of negotiation. But the risk is that the administration and congressional leaders will accept the $250 billion as a starting point, then declare a victory for fiscal sanity when they bring the number down to, say, $150 billion. Instead, Congress should ignore the Louisiana bill and force itself to think seriously about the sort of reconstruction that makes sense. Katrina has exposed mistakes of policy: water-infrastructure programs that made flooding more likely, and levees and insurance schemes that encouraged human settlement in dangerous places. Now that Congress is getting ready to spend tens of billions on reconstruction, it must seize the opportunity to correct those past errors.

I do agree that the government needs to wise in the way they administer the aid. I believe job one is getting the Dutch in here and build a super levee that would stop anything short of a nuke from breaking it. No one has talked about this but the reason the original levees broke was because a pumping station failed. This was inexcusible because at least one persons only job was to make sure the pumps were in working order. Secondly I believe in the power of capitalism. Instead of handouts they need to provide incentives for big business to come in.Create good jobs and people will come and spawn off smaller businesses. Do not let Blanco decide how the aid is adminstered.

The way FEMA gave out aid here was idiotic. They gave 2,000 dollars no questions asked for the first week. I know of one doctor in a million dollar home with a industrial generator that never left that recieved the aid. He had no damages and spent the money on a big screen tv. Although I had around 1,100 dollars in expenses related to Katrina I couldn't get a dime due to the abuse of the system. Not to mention I housed two families for over a week. I'm currently housing my brothers family from Lake Charles. He isn't rich and he may have lost his job. He called FEMA yesterday and they are asking more questions then they did for Katrina. They actually ask how much was your average annual income. It seems FEMA has figured out that if you were rich before the storm, you are probably rich after the storm and thus the aid should be directed to someone that may really need it. I hope he is able to recieve aid because although he has never been unemployed and he is very hard working, he is truly one of the needy.

I do agree that the government needs to wise in the way they administer the aid. I believe job one is getting the Dutch in here and build a super levee that would stop anything short of a nuke from breaking it. No one has talked about this but the reason the original levees broke was because a pumping station failed. This was inexcusible because at least one persons only job was to make sure the pumps were in working order. Secondly I believe in the power of capitalism. Instead of handouts they need to provide incentives for big business to come in.Create good jobs and people will come and spawn off smaller businesses. Do not let Blanco decide how the aid is adminstered.

The way FEMA gave out aid here was idiotic. They gave 2,000 dollars no questions asked for the first week. I know of one doctor in a million dollar home with a industrial generator that never left that recieved the aid. He had no damages and spent the money on a big screen tv. Although I had around 1,100 dollars in expenses related to Katrina I couldn't get a dime due to the abuse of the system. Not to mention I housed two families for over a week. I'm currently housing my brothers family from Lake Charles. He isn't rich and he may have lost his job. He called FEMA yesterday and they are asking more questions then they did for Katrina. They actually ask how much was your average annual income. It seems FEMA has figured out that if you were rich before the storm, you are probably rich after the storm and thus the aid should be directed to someone that may really need it. I hope he is able to recieve aid because although he has never been unemployed and he is very hard working, he is truly one of the needy.

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Agreed--I can't even figure out who is eligible for FEMA money and what the criteria are for receiving it. Many evacuees to Austin were homeless so in fact they suffered NO losses but received $2,000, up to 7 months free rent, vouchers for free furniture, clothes and food stamps.
Only now is Austin making the decision that those evacuees who were NOT at a FEMA shelter will not receive the extra 6 months of rent becuase they are afraid of fraud.

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